Hello from OK, about to build my first MB

A couple years ago I rearranged a mountain bike into a crank forward cruiser, so much more fun to ride. But this town is a little hilly so that got me to thinking. I have my sprockets etc ordered now, found a 31cc Troy Bilt trimmer on Craigslist. Got a mig welder, a 3 in 1 which is a mill/drill lathe combo, some other tools. I am ready to roll.

The plan is to build a jackshaft bike, I think I have my gear ratios figured out, maybe. My first career was auto mechanic, then construction. I love building things and really looking forward to this. I am 50, came down with stage 4 cancer last year. Too messed up from chemo to work, hopefully this project will help get me back on my feet. I want to make some more of them after I get one figured out.

This looks like a cool site, I have done a lot of looking around and learning. I recently went back to school for drafting & designing, next semester is some manufacturing engineering classes. Hopefully I can offer help here as well as learn.

Welcome, nice frame. How much does it weigh? Lots of steel for a 31cc. Lots of possibilities for that bike. Gasbike.com has a great sale going on for a 49cc bike kit, you might consider............how do your feet reach the pedals to pedal?

This bike was just a prototype so expenses were spared. The tubing is electrical conduit from the hardware store. The pedal reach is perfect for me and I have kind of short legs, might be a matter of perspective. I am a build it from scratch and recycle as much as feasibly possible kind of guy. Plus I want to figure out how to build these as cheaply from used stuff, I think there is a market for gas bikes if the price can be gotten down low enough. Maybe with a pipe I can get enough out of the trimmer head, just looking to make 20-25mph.

Welcome, nice frame. How much does it weigh? Lots of steel for a 31cc.

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Forgot to answer this question. It is not noticeably heavy. The factory tubing on this bike was .065" thick, the electrical conduit I got from Home Depot was .060" thick. Except for severe duty applications this conduit is a great poor mans frame material, $6.30 for a 10' stick of 1".

I've always used electrical conduit for quick and dirty bike frames, the stuff works great. between being dirt cheap and readily available and nearly as strong as nice expensive frame materials I don't see any reason not to use it

hi everyone, I'm a newbie to the forum. I want to build my own bike. anyone have any idea. Please help me. I'm gonna use that bike to travel across the country so your help would be very very useful for me. Thanks.